NHL Free Agents: The Worst Free Agent Signing in Each Team's History

Free agency signings in the NHL, like most sports, is a hit or miss proposition. Each year NHL teams empty out the bank to sign that one guy who will take them to the promised land.

Each year fans across the league rush out to their team shops to buy the new guy's jersey. They take it home and make plans for the Stanley Cup parade.

Those free agent dreams often don't come true.

Instead, many teams are left with a player who isn't what they thought he was going to be and are stuck with a huge contract. It can ruin a franchise, get coaches and general mangers fired and lead to fans ripping names and numbers off those jerseys.

This year's free agency frenzy saw some crazy contracts thrown about and again, a lot of excited fans who are convinced their team is now the league top contender (looking at you Rangers fans).

When looking at free agency, it's buyer beware.

Since hind sight is perfect, and fun, let's take a look at each teams biggest free agency mistake.

As always, feel free to mention anyone missed in the comments section.

Anaheim Ducks: Todd Bertuzzi

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The Ducks picked up the beefy winger in 2007, signing him to a two-year $8 million contract.

The hope was that Bertuzzi still had some spark left.

Bertuzzi wasn’t terrible in Anaheim, but they only got 40 points out of Bertuzzi and had to buy out his contract after one season to relieve their salary cap. Perhaps they wouldn’t have had cap troubles if they didn’t sign old and declining players to $4 million a year contracts.

Bertuzzi is still kicking around in the NHL, which is surprising as his best days are long gone. Hopefully, no other team will offer him money the way the Ducks did.

Atlanta Thrashers: Bobby Holik

Since Winnipeg hasn’t made many free-agent signings yet, the focus will remain with the now defunct Thrashers.

In 2005, they signed maligned Rangers forward to a three-year, $12.75 million contract. This move just makes you shake your head.

Holik could have been the Rangers selection on this list as he never lived up to his contract there.

What made Atlanta think giving him $4 million a year would be wise is beyond comprehension. To make matters worse, they made Holik the team captain.

Holik never scored more than 34 points in a season for that $4 million, and now Atlanta is in Winnipeg. Probably not his fault, but moves like this contributed to Atlanta’s poor performance and lack of attendance.

For Holik, he has the honor of receiving two of the worst contracts in NHL history.

Boston Bruins: Martin Lapointe

Lapointe potted a career high 27 goals for Detroit in 2000-2001. That was enough for the Bruins to fork over $5 million a year to wear a B on his chest.

Unfortunately, Lapointe never lived up to that contract or that career year by never scoring more than 17 goals or topping 40 points.

Those numbers are pretty good for a third liner but terrible for a guy you just locked in to a $5 million cap hit. After the lockout season, Bruins fans did not shed any tears as Lapointe landed in Chicago.

Carolina Hurricanes: Alexei Ponikarovsky

The Carolina Hurricanes have been a successful franchise since relocating down South. Trying to find free agent busts for them is like trying to find a highlight of a Sedin not falling over.

For that reason, newly signed Alexei Ponikarovsky is the winner here.

Again, it may be harsh to rip a guy who hasn’t played yet, but Ponikarovsky is going to make over a million dollars for Carolina next year. A million dollars for a guy who is over 30 and scored 15 big points last year.

Fifteen points gets you over a million in today’s NHL? I need to start skating more.

Chicago Blackhawks: Cristobal Huet

In 2008, the Blackhawks signed goalie Huet from the Capitals for a stunning four-year, $22.4 million contract.

In his two seasons with Chicago, he was beaten out by Nikolai Khabibulin and Anti Niemi.

The Blackhawks won the Stanley Cup behind Niemi and Huet’s contract contributed to the salary cap mess Chicago was in. In 2010-2011, Huet played for HC Fribourg in Europe, two years into his huge contract.

What is even more amazing, is that Huet gets his name on the Stanley Cup.

Colorado Avalanche: Ryan Smyth

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Smyth was the heart and soul for over a decade in Edmonton.

After spending the last part of the 2006-2007 season with the Islanders the Avalanche swooped in and signed the free agent to a five-year, $32 million contract. They were hoping to get that same gritty stand-in-front-of-the-net guy that had won the fans over in Edmonton.

While he wasn’t terrible in Colorado, he wasn’t $32 million good. He only lasted two seasons in Denver and scored 40 goals before being shipped to Los Angeles.

Dallas Stars: Sean Avery

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Everyone’s favorite pest signed with Dallas in 2008 for $15.5 million over four years at Avery.

Avery and Stars GM Brett Hull were former team mates and you have to wonder if Hull let his heart get in the way of good judgement. Avery didn’t last the season, made some controversial comments, got suspended and racked up 10 points in only 23 games.

He was back in New York by the end of the season. For Avery, he got paid and ended up back in New York which makes him the only winner here.

Montreal Canadiens: Sergei Samsonov

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The Canadiens took the plunge on Samsonov in 2006 for a cool two-year, $7.05 million.

That’s a lot of loonies for a guy who was always cited as someone with great potential but never quite lived up to it. He had some decent years in Boston, but with Montreal, he was an utter disappointment.

He only scored nine goals in his one-year stint with the Canadiens before being waived in February.

At $7 million for a partial season and nine goals, that's not good no matter what exchange rate the loonie is getting!

Nashville Predators: Radek Bonk

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The Predators don’t sign many free agents, so finding a bad one is hard to do.

You could argue that their two biggest free-agency signings, Jason Arnott and Paul Kariya, were bust merely because neither could lead the Predators past the second round of the playoffs. But it wouldn’t be fair to those guys as they had good years in Nashville.

So Bonk gets the prize.

Bonk was supposed to be the next big thing in the NHL, he had a scoring touch and a cool name.

After floundering around the league he was able to get a two-year deal for $2.95 million out of the Predators in 2007. That’s big money in Nashville, and Bonk was a disappointment only scoring 23 goals in those two seasons.

New Jersey Devils: Ilya Kovalchuk

The Devils had traded for Kovalchuk at the end of the 2009 season hoping that he would provide them with the 50 goal scoring ability he had shown in Atlanta.

After the season Kovalchuk became a free agent and part of one of the most bizarre and dramatic free agency frenzies ever seen.

Bidding between New Jersey and Los Angeles took off with the Devils finally landing him for a whopping 17 years and $102 million. That contract was voided by the league and the Devils amended it down to 15 years and $100 million for Kovalchuk’s skills.

It turns out that his skills are purely one dimensional, and after he and the team got off to a terrible start, the contract became an albatross.

Kovalchuk ended the season with a respectable 31 goals, but that contract could hamstring the Devils for years to come.

New York Islanders: Alexi Yashin

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OK, this one is a bit of a cheat since technically Yashin was traded to the Islanders on draft day (for Zdeno Chara, which makes this all the worse) from Ottawa to New York.

The reason he is on the list is because the first thing New York General Manager Mike Milbury did was re-sign him ( he had a year left on his contract) to what may be the most ridiculous contract of all time.

Ten years and $87.5 million for a player who never scored over 100 points and was a bit of a headache for the Senators.

Yashin came out of the gates strong, scoring 40 goals his first year on Long Island, but Islander fans saw his production decline each year after, and his contract made him un-tradeable.

Tired of paying a guy that much dough for 16 goals a season, the Islanders bought out his contract in 2007 and Yashin is now in the KHL stealing money from Russian teams.

The biggest question to come out of this signing is, how does anyone take Milbury seriously anymore?

San Jose Sharks: Kelly Hrudey

The Sharks signed the veteran Kelly Hrudey in 1996 as a free agent looking for what they called "consistency in goal" to become a contender.

Hrudey was signed for two years at $2.4 million a year.

In 1996, that was a pretty good contract for an older player. The Sharks didn’t quite get consistency from Hrudey and weren’t contenders. He only won 20 games for San Jose and never had a save percentage above .900.

The writing was on the wall for Hrudey and his head band, and he hung ‘em up after the 1997-1998 season for the comfort of the CBC broadcast booth.

Vancouver Canucks: Mark Messier

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Vancouver looked to make a big splash by reuniting the Captain with Mike Keenan in 1997. They gave the future Hall of Famer $6 million a year.

In return Messier wrestled the captaincy away from Mr. Canuck Trevor Linden (he was eventually traded by Kennan), demanded he be allowed to wear the number 11 which had been retired due to former Canucks Wayne Maki’s death and led Vancouver to zero playoff appearances.

All in all the signing of Mark Messier set the Canucks back and was nothing but a complete disaster.

Please, can every Canucks fan reading this stand up and join me in a nice hearty "Messier Sucks!" chant. It will make you feel better.